HR Summer Intern Review

I didn't know what to expect from my HR internship, but it certainly surpassed all expectations I might have had. I couldn't think of a better way to spend ten weeks of my summer - I learnt so much about the business and HR in general, and I really enjoyed the work that I was doing. I had the opportunity to be a part of a variety of different projects which meant I worked with many different people in different teams, and got a much better idea about all the different areas of HR. Even though there were some more time-consuming tasks such as filling in Excel spreadsheets, this is to be expected and I was always clear on why the work I was doing actually mattered in the bigger picture. All in all, I was in a great team doing great work, and I thoroughly enjoyed my time with RBS.

I couldn't have asked for a better team. They made me feel welcome from day one and were incredibly friendly, and my relationships with them developed more over the ten week internship to create a really comfortable working environment. I never felt like I was just 'the intern' who was being given all the dreg-ends of the work. Instead, I was made to feel part of the team and given important work to do, and that really helped me get involved and show my capability and enthusiasm. Their positive attitude towards me continued to the very last day, so I'm very grateful that I was placed in that team.

Again, my line manager was incredible. She put me at ease on my first day, and since then I've enjoyed a very positive working relationship with her. She made sure that I was set up correctly in the first week, and it was clear that she'd put a lot of thought into the work I was to be given, as well as the order of this work to give me the best experience. I really appreciated our weekly catch-ups as a chance to chat about what I've been up to and how I'm feeling, and I've always felt comfortable that I can talk to her if there have been any issues or worries. I've hugely enjoyed working with her, and I hope that she's enjoyed the experience as much as I have!

I was normally quite busy, which I preferred as it meant that I had to use my time management skills to keep being organised and make sure I met my deadlines. It helped that I was involved in a variety of projects, so I very rarely felt that I was doing the same thing for days and days on end, and the bulk of work meant that my days went very quickly and I had to quickly adapt to be productive all the time - my mid-afternoon slump is a thing of the past! Overall I think I had the perfect balance - there were some days where I felt that I had too little time for too much work, but they were few and far between.

I was given a mix of responsibilities depending on the project I was working on. For my three main projects, I was responsible for certain aspects such as writing help guide content or creating hierarchies, and my initial work was then second-brained by me and other members of the team. There were a couple of instances where I had full responsibility: I had to create my own webpage with corresponding articles; and I also had to run my line manager's project while she was away on holiday for two weeks. This gave me a great idea of what running a project is really like, and so it was a taste of the workplace which proved invaluable experience.

The skills that will help me most in my degree are definitely time management, organisation and productivity to increase my efficiency at university. In term time I normally work whenever I feel like working, which means that some essays can drag on needlessly. Now that I have experienced what it's like to work 9-5, I feel that I will take that continuous productivity away with me, and my work at university will be much more efficiently done. Beyond uni, what I've learnt about myself as a person and my people skills is going to be of real value: I've learnt some great lessons about how to manage people and get the best out of them and myself, which will stand me in really good stead for the future.

The general atmosphere was nothing like I'd imagined at all. I'd (possibly naively) thought that it was going to be a stuffy corporate office with very little down-time and a fast pace. But I actually found that this was a very old-fashioned view, and instead I was working in a lovely open atmosphere with lots of chatting and collaboration between people and teams, and I didn't feel uncomfortable at any point.

The overall internship could have been better organised from a communications point of view, as the information wasn't always relayed in the best way or at the best time. For example, I found out my location (which wasn't the one I was expecting) less than six weeks before starting and had to scramble to find accommodation while I was in the middle of my exams. I also only found out my team on my first day, which meant that I couldn't quite hit the ground running as much as I wanted to in the first couple of days, as I was still trying to catch up on information about the team. Having said that, during the internship itself things were well-organised with various events, so once I got here everything went much more smoothly from an organisation perspective.

I feel like the majority of my personal training/development came from my team, and that was of a really high standard. Nothing was too much trouble, and I feel that there was a real interest in how I felt I was developing and what could be done to further that development.

I could definitely see myself working for RBS in the future. From the glimpse I've got of HR during the internship, the work suits my capabilities and my ways of thinking, and I would be very happy to continue working for RBS and continuing the projects that I've been involved with over the summer. Feedback from my team has been really positive so I'm confident that if I did return I would be very welcome!

There was a varied social scene, as some people didn't get as involved with the social side as they could have done. For the most part, the people I was living with were absolutely lovely and they made a great effort in getting out and about in Edinburgh. I enjoyed socialising with everyone on a regular basis - although at points I had to be careful that I was sticking to my budget! But Edinburgh is a lovely place to be with loads of quirky bars and clubs, so it's definitely easy to socialise.

I was in Edinburgh staying in third-party accommodation (mainly geared towards students) that was a 20 minute bus ride away from work. I'm not sure whether my accommodation was an anomaly, but it was extortionately expensive for the quality that it was (problems with management, water issues, WiFi issues...) - but I don't think that this is the case for all Edinburgh accommodation! Travel was very cheap as I got the monthly ridacard which was great value and allowed me to explore Edinburgh more fully. In terms of socialising, it does start to get expensive if you consistently go to the nice cocktail bars/pubs/restaurants, but there are cheaper options (like Wetherspoons) to make sure your living costs don't go over your pay package!

The nightlife was a bit of a mixed bag: the bars and pubs were absolutely lovely and there was a really good mix of them, from cheaper options to the more up-market ones. I didn't sample as many proper clubs as other people did, but there's certainly a big variety of places to go on a night out (especially during the Fringe) that make socialising a lot easier.

There were some opportunities, but they weren't really emphasised or advertised as much as they could have been. For example I know there was a netball team, but there seemed to be no opportunity to join unless you expressed interest straight after the introductory presentation. From my point of view, there were activities that I could have been involved in, but normally by the time I got back from work/the gym there was very little time to do anything but eat and relax before bed.